been turned round, and that Erik had eaten the stronger share of the meal, she lamented that the good luck she had bred for her son should have passed to her stepson.  Soon she began to sigh, and entreat Eric that he should never fail to help his brother, whose mother had heaped on him fortune so rich and strange:  for by tasting a single savoury meal he had clearly attained sovereign wit and eloquence, besides the promise of success in combat.  She added also, that Roller was almost as capable of good counsel, and that he should not utterly miss the dainty that had been intended for him.  She also told him that in case of extreme and violent need, he could find speedy help by calling on her name; declaring that she trusted partially in her divine attributes, and that, consorting as she did in a manner with the gods, she wielded an innate and heavenly power.  Erik said that he was naturally drawn to stand by his brother, and that the bird was infamous which fouled its own nest.  But Kraka was more vexed by her own carelessness than weighed down by her son’s ill-fortune:  for in old time it made a craftsman bitterly ashamed to be outwitted by his own cleverness.

Then Kraka, accompanied by her husband, took away the brothers on their journey to the sea.  They embarked in a single ship, but soon attached two others.  They had already reached the coast of Denmark, when, reconnoitering, they learned that seven ships had come up at no great distance.  Then Erik bade two men who could speak the Danish tongue well, to go to them unclothed, and, in order to spy better, to complain to Odd of their nakedness, as if Erik had caused it, and to report when they had made careful scrutiny.  These men were received as friends by Odd, and hunted for every plan of the general with their sharp ears.  He had determined to attack the enemy unawares at daybreak, that he might massacre them the more speedily while they were swathed in their night garments:  for he said that men’s bodies were wont to be most dull and heavy at that hour of dawn.  He also told them, thereby hastening what was to prove his own destruction, that his ships were laden with stones fit for throwing.  The spies slipped off in the first sleep of the night, reported that Odd had filled all his vessels with pebbles, and also told everything else they had heard.  Erik now quite understood the case, and, when he considered the smallness of his own fleet, thought that he must call the waters to destroy the enemy, and win their aid for himself.

So he got into a boat and rowed, pulling silently, close up to the keels of the enemy; and gradually, by screwing in an auger, he bored the planks (a device practiced by Hadding and also by Frode), nearest to the water, and soon made good his return, the oar-beat being scarce audible.  Now he bore himself so warily, that not one of the watchers noted his approach or departure.  As he rowed off, the water got in through the chinks of Odd’s vessels, and sank